With life-threatening injuries, Bowen Knight is spirited away to a lab deep in the ocean where he meets Kaia, a BlackSea changeling who considers him the enemy despite the disconcerting attraction they share.

Human Alliance security chief Bowen Knight is fighting for his life. Not only has he been shot through the heart, but he’s also facing a degrading brain implant that was originally developed to help humans block invasion from the Psy race but is now failing, becoming a life-threatening time bomb. Installed in a supersecret underwater medical research facility run by BlackSea, the oceanic changeling pack, he wakes after two months in a coma to learn he has healed from the gunshot wound thanks to a new robotic heart and that the BlackSea medical team has developed a possible treatment for the brain implant. Humans across the planet have these implants, so a successful treatment would be a huge relief. However, his chances of surviving the experiment are slim. That makes it a problematic time to meet Kaia, his BlackSea doctor’s cousin and the first woman who’s attracted him enough to consider a relationship. Kaia can’t deny she’s attracted to him too, but she’s also convinced that he's directly responsible for the disappearance of a number of members of the BlackSea clan, including her best friend, Hugo. Bo and his BlackSea security counterpart, Malachai Rhys, begin investigating the disappearances and realize Hugo has a few secrets of his own. Meanwhile, the bond between Kaia and Bo intensifies and they try to pack a lifetime of experiences into the limited time they have before Bo's treatment might fail, but when the chemical compound at the heart of the treatment is stolen, a whole other set of threats may come between them. Paranormal romance author Singh continues her Psy-Changeling Trinity series with her typically impeccable worldbuilding, and fans will enjoy the foray into the oceanic world of BlackSea. This installment captivates with its intensity and liveliness despite an oddly zigzagging final quarter.

Another intricately plotted, vividly sensual love story from a romance favorite.

Over 50 years after an extraterrestrial microbe wiped out a small Arizona town, something very strange has appeared in the Amazon jungle in Wilson’s follow-up to Crichton’s The Andromeda Strain.

The microparticle's introduction to Earth in 1967 was the disastrous result of an American weapons research program. Before it could be contained, Andromeda killed all but two people in tiny Piedmont, Arizona; during testing after the disaster, AS-1 evolved and escaped into the atmosphere. Project Eternal Vigilance was quickly set up to scan for any possible new outbreaks of Andromeda. Now, an anomaly with “signature peaks” closely resembling the original Andromeda Strain has been spotted in the heart of the Amazon, and a Wildfire Alert is issued. A diverse team is assembled: Nidhi Vedala, an MIT nanotechnology expert born in a Mumbai slum; Harold Odhiambo, a Kenyan xenogeologist; Peng Wu, a Chinese doctor and taikonaut; Sophie Kline, a paraplegic astronaut and nanorobotics expert based on the International Space Station; and, a last-minute addition, roboticist James Stone, son of Dr. Jeremy Stone from The Andromeda Strain. They must journey into the deepest part of the jungle to study and hopefully contain the dire threat that the anomaly seemingly poses to humanity. But the jungle has its own dangers, and it’s not long before distrust and suspicion grip the team. They’ll need to come together to take on what waits for them inside a mysterious structure that may not be of this world. Setting the story over the course of five days, Wilson (Robopocalypse, 2011, etc.) combines the best elements of hard SF novels and techno-thrillers, using recovered video, audio, and interview transcripts to shape the narrative, with his own robotics expertise adding flavor and heft. Despite a bit of acronym overload, this is an atmospheric and often terrifying roller-coaster ride with (literally) sky-high stakes that pays plenty of homage to The Andromeda Strain while also echoing the spirit and mood of Crichton’s other works, such as Jurassic Park and Congo. Add more than a few twists and exciting set pieces (especially in the finale) to the mix, and you’ve got a winner.

Manic parodist Moore, fresh off a season in 1947 San Francisco (Noir, 2018), returns with a rare gift for Shakespeare fans who think A Midsummer Night’s Dream would be perfect if only it were a little more madcap.

Cast adrift by pirates together with his apprentice, halfwit giant Drool, and Jeff, his barely less intelligent monkey, Pocket of Dog Snogging upon Ouze, jester to the late King Lear, washes ashore in Shakespeare’s Athens, where Cobweb, a squirrel by day and fairy by night, takes him under her wing and other parts. Soon after he encounters Robin Goodfellow (the Puck), jester to shadow king Oberon, and Nick Bottom and the other clueless mechanicals rehearsing Pyramus and Thisby in a nearby forest before they present it in celebration of the wedding of Theseus, Duke of Athens, to Hippolyta, the captive Amazon queen who’s captured his heart, Pocket (The Serpent of Venice, 2014, etc.) finds Robin fatally shot by an arrow. Suspected briefly of the murder himself, he’s commissioned, first by Hippolyta, then by the unwitting Theseus, to identify the Puck’s killer. Oh, and Egeus, the Duke’s steward, wants him to find and execute Lysander, who’s run off with Egeus’ daughter, Hermia, instead of marrying Helena, who’s in love with Demetrius. As English majors can attest, a remarkable amount of this madness can already be found in Shakespeare’s play. Moore’s contribution is to amp up the couplings, bawdy language, violence, and metatextual analogies between the royals, the fairies, the mechanicals, his own interloping hero, and any number of other plays by the Bard.